Book description
When the elderly Allan Armadale makes a terrible confession on his
death-bed, he has little idea of the repercussions to come, for the
secret he reveals involves the mysterious Lydia Gwilt: flame-haired
temptress, bigamist, laudanum addict and husband-poisoner. Her malicious
intrigues fuel the plot of this gripping melodrama: a tale of confused
identities, inherited curses, romantic rivalries, espionage, money - and
murder. The character of Lydia Gwilt horrified contemporary critics,
with one reviewer describing her as 'One of the most hardened female
villains whose devices and desires have ever blackened fiction'. She
remains among the most enigmatic and fascinating women in
nineteenth-century literature and the dark heart of this most
sensational of Victorian 'sensation novels'.
Wilkie Collins was born in London in 1824. From the early 1850s he
was a friend of Charles Dickens' and contributed to Household Works.
Collins began by writing plays, but is most remembered for his novels,
including The Moonstone (1868) and The Woman in White (1860). He died
in 1889.
John Sutherland is Professor of English at University College,
London. He has edited many books for Penguin Classics, including
Anthony Trollope.
